Reviving The Kwararafa Ideology

-Dantani Useni Attahgani
Nigeria is made up of two main cultural spheres, the Afroasians and Niger-Congo ethnolinguistic family. The niger-congo is subdivided into Volta-Niger and Benue-Congo subfamily group
The benue-congo group runs from the middle belt down to southern Nigeria through central to east Africa down to south Africa. It is further divided into
(1) PLATOID languages spoken in plateau through southern Kaduna to Niger state (eg. Adara, tarok, berom etc)
(2) BANTOID languages spoken in Nigeria, central, east and south Africa (eg. Ebibio, Efick, Anang, Bantu etc)
(3) JUKUNOID languages spoken in taraba and part of cameroon (eg. Wapan, Kuteb, Yukuben, Wurbo, Wanu etc)
All the benue-congo family group trace their link to taraba, the seat of kwararafa Confederacy led by the jukun.
Kwararafa was a continuum of languages and diverse cultural sphere united under the spiritual leadership of AKU UKA. The jukun-ibibio corridor (taraba-calabar or middle belt-south) appears to be the cultural Origin and spiritual center of all the benue-congo languages. They unite and establish the kwararafa Confederacy which cultural influence extended to southern Kaduna in the west, pindiga and kona in the north and cross river in the south. The jukun has cultural linkage with the igbo through the jukun-ibibio-arochukwu influence, it is link with the ibibio and the akpa people of cross river and further link withe arochukwu through the akpa culture and the calabar town which was driven from the jukun word katakpa.
So the akpa culture is the true cultural linkage between the south and the middle belt united under one kwararafa kingdom.
As it is today, close to 300 languages in Nigeria and beyond cannot write their history without mentioning the jukun or the kwararafa. That is to show how important the jukun are and how influential the kwararafa kingdom was.
So why fighting ourselves over the stool of takum, which can be resolve at a round table dialogue? Why tiring ourselves apart in the name of self struggle and determination by both the kuteb and chamba brother? We have a bigger problem laying ahead of us, why wasting our resources fighting ourselves? When we can use that resource to fight for our collective good?
Kwararafa is the origin of the benue-congo ethnolinguistic language family which wast headed by AKU UKA of wukari as the spiritual head, the coalition of this people unite under one apa-jukun attacked and restrained the spread of Islamic Afroastic imperialism, they attacked kano, zaria, katsina and borno to defend there cultural identity and protect there territory. However as time goes by, they fail one by one to the Islamic imperialist, but still united under one spiritual head and continue to resist the Islamic imperialist. This struggle led to many kwararafa member to move southward and some into central, east and south Africa.
The British colonial masters came, took control and defeated the imperialist.
They also make a mistake by breaking the remaining kwararafa nation into south and middle belt and place the middle belt under the control of the northern Islamic caliphate.
The implication of this is that, we can never get true economic and political justice, we may struggle forever but will never get the needed justice.
Hn order to free ourselves from this unfair Islamic caliphalistic imperialist call Afroasians and British unjust demarcation that split us into group and separate some of us from our real brothers and our cultural lineage. We must articulate and unify the middle belt and the south through reviving the kwararafa spirit and cultural heritage, we must understand that the south and the middle belt originated from the same kwararafa root and share common cultural heritage, we must understand the CROCODILE Tatum and linkage between MARMARA POND IN WUKARI TO RAFIN-KADA CROSS TO RIVER KADUNA AND DOWN TO THE ATLANTIC OCEAN IN CALABAR.
This is our territory, this is our identity, we must come together and fight for our collective aspiration and protect our economic, political and Cultural identity.
The bulk of this fight rest on our shoulder here, we are the custodian of the kwararafa cultural heritage, the dispatching of the benue-congo language family started here in taraba and the middle belt, we must lead the fight (but first, we must unite ourselves), our brothers in southern Kaduna are suffering because of our negligence, we left the at the mercies of there oppressors. They cannot fight this imperialist all along, we must join hand, else we will be next. We must therefore alliance in solidarity to fight for the restructuring of the middle belt to push back this Afroasian imperialist threatening our individual existence.
there is a grand plan to take over the whole of middle belt by the Afroasians and on less we come together in solidarity with the revival of our cultural identity of the middle belt and the south we will soon be overrun, the fight has started and its coming gradually, this is a call for us all to rise to the reality on ground.
Our fight may not be by weapon, but by joining our voice in solidarity and support. We must fight to reunite with the south to be safe from the impending danger ahead.
MURI AND SHITTA, KUTEB AND CHAMBA, IBI TO WUKARI THROUGH DONGA, TAKUM TO USSA, JUKUN AND JUKUNOID
This is what i stand for, this is my believe, this is what we should be fighting for, this is what we should project and protect, this is our identity, this is our ideology.
I pray we will all unite and join our voice in solidarity for the revival of the kwararafa kingdom